When Michelle Gabriel started working as a mail carrier in 1990, her day started with the carriers sorting huge stacks of letters by hand.

Three decades later, most of the mail comes pre-sorted and with a barcode. The number of letters has dwindled. Mostly packages come through now.

“People need to get pen pals,” Gabriel said with a laugh.

Soon, the friendly face behind the counter at the post office who knows everyone by name will leave behind the career that she started at age 24 and never expected would become her home away from home.

After 31 years with the U.S. Postal Service, 21 of which were spent in Eudora, Gabriel will retire in May.

Gabriel said what she will miss the most is the interactions with the warm and friendly faces of the Eudora community. She said her husband and his family all grew up in Eudora, but now she’s the one who knows the town best.

She said one customer even joked about starting a petition to boycott her retirement.

“The people,” Gabriel said of what she will miss. “Most of them are super nice and happy and caring.”

Despite the postal system becoming less personal and more automated in recent decades, Gabriel has continued to embody the small-town post office spirit.

Her daughter, Lauren, said she’s always known her mother’s dedication to the job. She remembers being carted up to the post office with her sister on a Sunday while her mom grabbed a package for someone who had just come into town and needed their mail.

“She’s always just kind of gone above and beyond for her customers and doing more than she’s asked to do,” Lauren Gabriel said.

Gabriel’s retirement will come a few months after Juanita Oberheide, the former postmaster, retired in March. Oberheide did not return requests for an interview by the time of publication.

Jeff Mank has filled in as postmaster and said his transition to Eudora would not have been possible without Gabriel. Mank said he’s always wanted to work in a small town post office because of its community feel, and he said no one embodies that sense of community better than Gabriel.

“Just the fact that she stands here and knows everyone that comes in,” Mank said. “Being involved with the community you’re serving, Michelle is the epitome of that.”

It’s just Gabriel and Mank at the Eudora Post Office as all of the mail carriers are now sourced from De Soto. Gabriel said the switch happened around 2013, and recently a lot of carriers have stopped having door-to-door routes in favor of “cluster boxes.”

“It takes away a lot of the personal part of it,” Gabriel said. “Carriers can’t even put a face to a house.”

Gabriel still has the face-to-face element in her position as a sales and service associate, even as the USPS encourages customers to do more processing online.

She knows she’ll miss the interaction with customers and expects she’ll get stir-crazy and begin looking for a small job in the fall.

“I’ve worked since I was 14. I’m not really sure what I’ll do without working,” she said.

In the meantime, she said she’s excited to spend the summer working with her husband on their farm.

“I’ve never been able to be just a farm wife and mom,” Gabriel said.

A retirement party for Gabriel will take place at The Lodge across the street from the post office on May 28, Gabriel’s last day.

Her daughter said anyone is welcome to stop by between 6-9 p.m. to celebrate the retirement.

“Anyone that she’s helped in her time at Eudora,” Lauren Gabriel said. “It would mean the world to her.”

Reach reporter Cami Koons at [email protected].

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